Equal Responsibility in the Queueing Problem

This is a double seminar

Program

14:45-15:45 Youngsub Chun (Seoul National University, South Korea)

Abstract

In the context of the queueing problem, we investigate fair compensation through the lens of individual responsibility. Our fairness approach is grounded in the principle that
certain groups of agents bear equal responsibility for changes in economic environments and should therefore be affected by the same magnitude. To formalize this idea, we introduce equal responsibility axioms, which require that any change in an agent’s unit waiting cost must lead to a uniform adjustment in the transfers of either all precedingagents or all following agents.

We propose a family of equally responsible transfer rules and provide characterizations of this family based on efficiency, Pareto indifference, equal treatment of equals, and either preceding-cost equal responsibility or following-cost equal responsibility. To further refine our analysis, we impose additional axioms that define notable subfamilies, specifically the linear transfer rules and the convex transfer rules, which capture different ways of structuring compensation adjustments. Furthermore, within this family, we identify three distinguished transfer rules - the minimal transfer rule, the maximal transfer rule, and the average transfer rule - each offering a unique perspective on the distribution of responsibility and fairness in queueing. Joint paper with Changyong Han and Ching-Jen Sun.

16:00-17:00 Min-Hung Tsay (Academia Sinica, Taiwan)